| Black Mountain Lady |
Jay
Dyck
Dyck
Diary of a Goatherder January 23, 1980 (continued)
Today when I brought the goats in at sundown, their grain had not been placed in the
feeder, and Bob was not around. I herded them into the pen and fastened the gate. Then I
went up to the camper shell that we use as a feed room. I noticed that Bob's car was gone.
Today when I brought the goats in at sundown, their grain had not been placed in the
feeder, and Bob was not around. I herded them into the pen and fastened the gate. Then I
went up to the camper shell that we use as a feed room. I noticed that Bob's car was gone.
| Chapter Seven BOB |
One day, Bob Cabler and Johnny went for a ride, feeding the horses at Marilyn Wells' barn early, and
departing at dawn.
The countryside was utterly beautiful. It was spring. It was foggy straight from the ocean. The canyon pastures
and bean fields were full with a light haze of the stuff, making everything pastel shades, the oaks and
sycamores. They rode around the end of the ridge, past the big eucalyptus tree, and up Gonzalez Canyon. They
bypassed the house, where Marilyn and Al Wells still slept, and took the trail on the south side of the field of
gourds. They headed east. Eventually they came out on the ridge top, joining up first with the ranch road that
angled up the side of the canyon.
Above the fog now, the sky ahead was rosy purple, and Black Mountain was etched in ebony against the red
beauty. They rode in silence. As far as the eye could see in every direction were the distant empty tops of other
mesas and ridges. Small, wild groves of eucalyptus dotted the horizons. Canyons laced the entire scene,
invisible but for the draws that tugged at the ridgeline from north and south. More eucalyptus, mostly saplings,
but occasional giants, the aged progenitors from another generation, hatched from the earth in another wet
year, occurred in clumps in the openings of the draws.
They skirted the main collection of buildings at the Heinz ranch, again veering south, past the dam with the
double row of trees along its top. More mist was rising from the full pond that waited above the dam.
There was the ranch house, painted white, and several modest barns, sheds, silos and corrals, all unpainted, and
everything redwood. Further east, the clip and clop of the horses hooves mixed with the first bird calls. The sky
was glowing to a burst. They rode in silence.
The first peep of the sun came directly over the peak of Black Mountain. The rays shed down the slope like
yellow slivers, long yellow slivers radiating into a black triangle.
They rode in silence, and the years fled, and one day the two buckaroos were gone forever. But Johnny Stream
had a daughter. Could she have been found (she was wary as a bobcat), it would have been in those same hills,
in sight of that same mountain. One evening, as the new moon slipped to the horizon, she had what could be
called a vision, a spell, or an illusion. She thought about it in the quiet dark that followed:
La Luna! The moon! What a revelation! I feel like dancing for joy! That I should be the one to know, the one to
see, the one to be!
The panther spoke to Daddy Johnny once; I know for I heard him mumbling about it when he was drunk,
many times. And now the moon has spoken to me. I wish it all were true, and so it is.
Is this magic? I walk in a dream of all she said to me. I can hardly believe how blessed I am. Why, it's only now
that she has set that I can think at all. We're sisters, she and I, and I am…
Diana sunk to her knees. The hooves of a wandering steer had crumbled the rich, spring earth of a tiny bluff.
Diana seized it with gentle ferocity, scooping the earth with both hands. It was like she didn't want to hurt it,
knowing all along that she couldn't hurt it if she tried.
I am earth. I am Earth. She grew quiet and looked to the west, to where her own horizon hid her sister moon
from view.
"I still see you," she whispered after some time, for it was true. The pearly radiance still loomed against the
night. But she saw more than that, for the moon still was there, not gone from Earth but merely gone around,
chasing as ever the sun, and as each revolution expired, she came to the day when she shared not her face with
her sister, the earth, but had her own moment of solar privacy.
Then once again the night would come when she would reveal just the tiniest smile, the sliver of a glimpse, as
her orbit pulled her back from her lover's warm gaze, and back into the confidence of her fertile sister.
"I still see you," whispered Diana, and she spoke for the earth that she held in her hands, the earth that
stained her feet, the earth upon which she knelt, the earth that was her body and that showed the tear-streaks
on her cheeks, the earth that spun and capered through space with her teasing, virgin satellite.
Later, her mind more composed, refreshed from the panic of her vision, Diana walked in starlight upon the
long dirt road that wound along Shaw Ridge. She remembered her ma telling her, "The young moon goes to bed
early, but the old moon stays up late. " Diana longed for tomorrow night to come, when her sweet confidante
would stay up nearly an hour longer.
"I don't have no other friends," she pouted, shuffling her bare feet with long familiarity in the dust of the
unlighted road. She may have been privy to the secrets of the universe, but she was also just a girl. She may
not have been afraid anymore, if ever she was, but she still was lonely. Her whining thought, that she had no
friends, reminded her of Joe, down at the station. She decided to go there.
She continued to walk along the ridge toward the west, selecting from the maze of options, old ranch roads
branching out to this or that dead-end spur, till she descended into the canyon known as Arroyo Sorrento.
There were homes here and there in this offshoot of Sorrento Valley. Diana walked soundlessly past. The odd
dog barked, but no general alarm was raised. She glided past like any opossum or bobcat.
departing at dawn.
The countryside was utterly beautiful. It was spring. It was foggy straight from the ocean. The canyon pastures
and bean fields were full with a light haze of the stuff, making everything pastel shades, the oaks and
sycamores. They rode around the end of the ridge, past the big eucalyptus tree, and up Gonzalez Canyon. They
bypassed the house, where Marilyn and Al Wells still slept, and took the trail on the south side of the field of
gourds. They headed east. Eventually they came out on the ridge top, joining up first with the ranch road that
angled up the side of the canyon.
Above the fog now, the sky ahead was rosy purple, and Black Mountain was etched in ebony against the red
beauty. They rode in silence. As far as the eye could see in every direction were the distant empty tops of other
mesas and ridges. Small, wild groves of eucalyptus dotted the horizons. Canyons laced the entire scene,
invisible but for the draws that tugged at the ridgeline from north and south. More eucalyptus, mostly saplings,
but occasional giants, the aged progenitors from another generation, hatched from the earth in another wet
year, occurred in clumps in the openings of the draws.
They skirted the main collection of buildings at the Heinz ranch, again veering south, past the dam with the
double row of trees along its top. More mist was rising from the full pond that waited above the dam.
There was the ranch house, painted white, and several modest barns, sheds, silos and corrals, all unpainted, and
everything redwood. Further east, the clip and clop of the horses hooves mixed with the first bird calls. The sky
was glowing to a burst. They rode in silence.
The first peep of the sun came directly over the peak of Black Mountain. The rays shed down the slope like
yellow slivers, long yellow slivers radiating into a black triangle.
They rode in silence, and the years fled, and one day the two buckaroos were gone forever. But Johnny Stream
had a daughter. Could she have been found (she was wary as a bobcat), it would have been in those same hills,
in sight of that same mountain. One evening, as the new moon slipped to the horizon, she had what could be
called a vision, a spell, or an illusion. She thought about it in the quiet dark that followed:
La Luna! The moon! What a revelation! I feel like dancing for joy! That I should be the one to know, the one to
see, the one to be!
The panther spoke to Daddy Johnny once; I know for I heard him mumbling about it when he was drunk,
many times. And now the moon has spoken to me. I wish it all were true, and so it is.
Is this magic? I walk in a dream of all she said to me. I can hardly believe how blessed I am. Why, it's only now
that she has set that I can think at all. We're sisters, she and I, and I am…
Diana sunk to her knees. The hooves of a wandering steer had crumbled the rich, spring earth of a tiny bluff.
Diana seized it with gentle ferocity, scooping the earth with both hands. It was like she didn't want to hurt it,
knowing all along that she couldn't hurt it if she tried.
I am earth. I am Earth. She grew quiet and looked to the west, to where her own horizon hid her sister moon
from view.
"I still see you," she whispered after some time, for it was true. The pearly radiance still loomed against the
night. But she saw more than that, for the moon still was there, not gone from Earth but merely gone around,
chasing as ever the sun, and as each revolution expired, she came to the day when she shared not her face with
her sister, the earth, but had her own moment of solar privacy.
Then once again the night would come when she would reveal just the tiniest smile, the sliver of a glimpse, as
her orbit pulled her back from her lover's warm gaze, and back into the confidence of her fertile sister.
"I still see you," whispered Diana, and she spoke for the earth that she held in her hands, the earth that
stained her feet, the earth upon which she knelt, the earth that was her body and that showed the tear-streaks
on her cheeks, the earth that spun and capered through space with her teasing, virgin satellite.
Later, her mind more composed, refreshed from the panic of her vision, Diana walked in starlight upon the
long dirt road that wound along Shaw Ridge. She remembered her ma telling her, "The young moon goes to bed
early, but the old moon stays up late. " Diana longed for tomorrow night to come, when her sweet confidante
would stay up nearly an hour longer.
"I don't have no other friends," she pouted, shuffling her bare feet with long familiarity in the dust of the
unlighted road. She may have been privy to the secrets of the universe, but she was also just a girl. She may
not have been afraid anymore, if ever she was, but she still was lonely. Her whining thought, that she had no
friends, reminded her of Joe, down at the station. She decided to go there.
She continued to walk along the ridge toward the west, selecting from the maze of options, old ranch roads
branching out to this or that dead-end spur, till she descended into the canyon known as Arroyo Sorrento.
There were homes here and there in this offshoot of Sorrento Valley. Diana walked soundlessly past. The odd
dog barked, but no general alarm was raised. She glided past like any opossum or bobcat.
